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Video: The War Next Door: Mexico's vicious battle

Transcript of: The War Next Door: Mexico's vicious battle

BRIAN WILLIAMS, anchor:Now to a war going on right next door to this country in
Mexico
, where the
government
is in a fierce fight with the
drug cartels
, which also have operations in at least what's estimated to be 270
American cities
and where they're bringing in up to $39 billion a year from the
drug trade
in the US. We'll be focusing on this dangerous and violent
war next door
in
Mexico
in an ongoing series of special reports. Tonight,
NBC
's
Mark Potter
on the extent of the narco insurgency.

MARK POTTER reporting:With terror in the streets just south of the US border, the
Mexican government
is struggling to keep a lid on the rapidly escalating violence that has now claimed 28,000 lives in a nearly four-year
drug war
, pitting cartel against cartel and against the
government
. The savagery is hard to imagine, with mass killings, beheadings and corpses strewn in public as traffickers lash out against rivals and the authorities.
Tony Payan
of the
University of Texas at El Paso
is an expert on Mexican
drug cartels
.

Mr. TONY PAYAN (University of Texas At El Paso):You could say they're a kind of an insurgency. They're beginning to learn and to use tactics that are generally associated with insurgency.

Mr. ANTHONY COULSON (Former Drug Enforcement Administration Supervisor):It's getting worse.
I have never seen
it at this level before.

POTTER:Anthony Coulson
is a recently retired
DEA
supervisor in
Tuscon
,
Arizona
. He says the Mexican traffickers produce more drugs and are stronger now than ever.

Mr. COULSON:And they're flourishing as an -- as almost an empire, a drug empire.

POTTER:Mexican President
Felipe Calderon
is waging an unprecedented war against the
drug cartels
, and warns the traffickers threaten civil order and the state. So far five mayors have been killed this year, and a gubernatorial candidate was shot dead on a highway.

Mr. JOSE REYES FERRIZ (Juarez, Mexico, Mayor):The state is not prepared to handle that type of situation. The
police forces
in
Mexico
are too small.

POTTER:Jose Reyes Ferriz
is the mayor of
Juarez
,
Mexico
, where 2800 people were killed in drug violence last year. He travels with tight security. How many threats do you get, and how seriously are they taken?

Mr. FERRIZ:Oh, well, we take them very seriously. We started getting threats right after I took office.

POTTER:In downtown
Juarez
, next to
El Paso
,
Texas
...

Mr. FERRIZ:This is the place
where the -- where the bomb exploded.

POTTER:...Mayor
Reyes
showed us where a
car bomb
aimed at police killed three people. This -- when this
car bomb
went off, this was a real ratcheting up of the violence here, correct?

Mr. FERRIZ:It was. It was. There was -- had never been used in
Juarez
.

POTTER:To lure police to the scene, traffickers shot a man, dressed him in a police uniform, laid him on the street, called for help, then when
federal police
arrived set off a remote controlled bomb caught on tape. Since then there have been other car bombs in
Mexico
, and traffickers threaten more. The horrific violence here in
Juarez
and elsewhere in
Mexico
is directly linked to the
United States
, as traffickers fight for control of smuggling routes to the
United States
. Anyone standing in the way is a target for murder. In
Creole
,
Mexico
, a police security camera revealed the brazenness of
drug traffickers
, who shut down a highway, threatened drivers and kill nine people here. Many villages near the border have become ghost towns after the traffickers threatened or killed the residents to clear the way for drug loads bound for
US cities
.

Mr. DAVID GADDIS (Drug Enforcement Administration):We, too, have to look at it seriously in our country. It is our country's number one organized crime threat.

POTTER:A hard-fought war by the
Mexican government
, supported by the US, but still far from being won.
Mark Potter
, NBC News,
Juarez
,
Mexico
.

WILLIAMS:By the way, there's more of
Mark
's reporting on this topic.
It's on
our
Web